Finance Trustee

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**About Us**

Abbeyfield Southern Oaks is deeply interconnected with the local community on many levels in the spirit and practice of our vision and values. Residents, employees, trustees, volunteers and service professionals are all drawn from the local area. Abbeyfield Southern Oaks is a not-for-profit organisation. We provide supported housing for people who are still able to care for themselves and wish to remain independent. Our residents generally don’t want the responsibilities of maintaining a house or flat, or a garden, but they’re not ready to go into a care home. We currently have five supported houses with between 4-11 residents in each at any one time.

We also recently developed Nonsuch Abbeyfield, a supportive, vibrant retirement village in Surrey where active, independent living is at its heart. 36 of the flats are owned by leaseholders while the rest are rented at an agreed affordable rent, frequently when residents have been referred by the local council.

**Background to the role**

With our plans to develop and grow our offer, our current Finance Trustee wishes to step back to focus on other areas and we need to replenish this important range of skills and expertise on the Board.

In addition to our quarterly Board meetings, Trustees may be asked to sit on sub-committees and attend ad hoc meetings. The time commitment will be on average one to two days a month and can be delivered across the year in a flexible way.

**Main Responsibilities**

Overall purpose of the Finance Trustee role
- Overseeing the financial affairs of the organisation, providing assurance to the Board of Trustees, and ensuring that they are legal, constitutional and within accepted accounting practice
- Ensuring that effective financial policies, procedures and controls are in place, giving expert strategic advice to the executive team to ensure good practice and compliance with charity accounting rules
- Chairing the Finance Committee, a sub-committee of the Board working with the Services Committee, which oversees all financial matters and leads financial planning and practice, reporting to the Board
- Working with the Risk and Oversight Committee

**Person Specification**
- A qualified accounting and finance professional or another suitably qualified professional with extensive business management experience.
- Significant, practical finance experience at a strategic level, including especially the development and monitoring of business plans and performance for sustaining and growing the Society’s business
- Experience of overseeing and supporting staff responsible for accounting, budgeting, longer term financial planning and management reporting to Trustees
- Experience of managing finance systems sufficient to lead and oversee the finance and related systems aspects of any potential takeover of, or merger.
- Ability to communicate complex finance and accounting issues to non-financial colleagues so as to lead on financial reporting to regulators, and Board members

**Diversity and inclusion**

**How to apply